Stage 9 - February 10: Kuala Lumpur - Kuala Lumpur, 170.5 km

Brutt strength: A tick in the box for Tinkoff

Charteau shows courage under fire

Ever since they announced their entry into the professional peloton some months
ago, Tinkoff Credit Systems have talked the talk. And it wasn't much more than
that.

But on a stinking hot Saturday in Seremban, 25 year-old Pavel Brutt walked
the walk. Held on a brutal up-and-down, 173 kilometre-long parcours, the super-strong
Russian used a combination of determination and brute strength to first go away
in the day's early move, open a lead that at one stage threatened the maillot
jaune, before changing his tactics in an all-out assault for victory.

As Brutt crossed the line with his fist clenched low, three seconds clear of
Sergey Kolesnikov (Unibet.com) and Pierre Drancourt (Bouygues Telecom), one
could see from his facial expression that victory was significant. "It was a
very difficult stage - I think it was nine and a half... no, ten," he smiled,
asked to rate the difficulty of today's effort out of ten. "But to be the first
Tinkoff rider to win a stage, I'm very happy."

The Crédit Agricole team of race leader Anthony Charteau was clearly on the
defensive today, and right from the get-go. But, unperturbed, the maillot
jaune showed serious courage under fire, containing the Tinkoff assault
and limiting his losses to just thirty-four seconds by the day's end.

"Today was an extremely hard stage - the attacks went early, and the composition
of the breakaway was not exactly in our favour, so we had to work very hard
behind," said Charteau.

"We thought after yesterday that Selle Italia would attack again, so although
the Tinkoff riders were impressive, we still marked the Selle Italia riders.
The heat as well as the terrain made it tough, but my advantage is that I like
the heat, and I could see my adversaries were tiring at the end - I was feeling
really good in the last kilometres of the race."

A 56 kilometre procession of sorts is all that's left before the 27 year-old
Frenchman is crowned winner of the 2007 Le Tour de Langkawi. It's a formality
- and an opportunity for Alberto Loddo to grab a fifth stage win - but for Charteau,
complete relief won't show till the race is done and dusted - which should be
no later than 6:00pm tomorrow evening.

"I know I will have the yellow jersey tomorrow," Charteau said, his tone growing
more confident by the minute. "I have a good team of riders behind me, and I
think it's going to be more of a spectacle than a fight for GC."

How it unfolded

By no means a cakewalk, the penultimate stage of the 2007 Le Tour de Langkawi
was the last real opportunity to force any change at the top of the leaderboard.
Over 173.1 kilometres, Stage 9 would be flat for only the first 80 clicks, before
the riders faced some serious up-and-down action. Beginning with the Cat. 2
climb to Bukit Tangga, its peak at km 137.8, the riders would then be faced
with a Cat.3 and Cat. 4 ascent in the closing 15 kilometres (km 157.6 and km
164). In short, a worthy test for the maillot jaune of Anthony Charteau.

A hot, hot 11.30am start in the political capital of Putrajaya kicked off proceedings
for 111 riders, 13 short after yesterday's savage ride to Genting. Half and
hour later, 13 riders went clear, including the names of Voeckler, Drancourt,
Kolesnikov, Klimov, Brutt, Tomei, Duyn, Barroso, Kannemeyer, Clarke, Arashiro,
Mostafa, and Park. Best-placed was Brutt at ninth overall, 5'08 behind Charteau
at the start of the day.

With only Crédit Agricole working in the peloton and the break working hard
out front, courtesy of a strong young Russian connection, the gap between the
two groups grew to a dangerous three minutes flat after 60 kilometres, also
sparking a four-man counter containing Pasamontes, Rujano, George, Serpa and
Commesso shortly thereafter. A few from the latter group made it across and
by km 115, there were seven leading riders holding a tenuous 25 second advantage
over the groupe maillot jaune: Drancourt, Kolesnikov, Brutt, Clarke,
George, Tomei and Duyn.

Having only the strongest left helped to widen the elastic band, but Clarke,
Tomei and Duyn became victims of the searing pace being set out front, creating
a final selection of just four men - Pierre Drancourt (Bougyues Telecom), Kolesnikov
(Unibet.com), Pavel Brutt (Tinkoff Credit Systems), and George (South Africa).
With 25 kilometres to go, the break had just 45 seconds' advantage over the
peloton, which was still around 30 strong and still contained the maillot
jaune of Charteau. At km 152 (21k remaining), the four leaders still remained,
although Unibet.com's Luis Pasamontes and José Rujano had attacked the groupe
maillot jaune and were closing in fast.

Beginning the second to last climb at Lenggeng, the front group had stretched
out their advantage to 55 seconds, the best-placed now being defending champion
George, 3'36 behind Charteau and fourth on GC. However, the South African's
deficit to third-placed Walter Pedraza (Serramenti PVC Diquigiovanni-Selle Italia)
was over two minutes, so, at this point, all were thinking only of a stage win.

Behind them, the peloton began breaking up, circumstances that worked to the
advantage of the break. By the final climb to Bukit Mantin, Rujano had bridged
to the leaders and led the five-strong group over the last prime of the day,
which signalled just nine kilometres of downhill to go. At this point, a tenuous
50 seconds was all that separated break from bunch... would it be enough?

Some tricky corners leading into the streets of Seremban turned out to be the
perfect recipe for wily Tinkoff man Pavel Brutt, who jumped his companions 800
metres from the line to deservedly win the stage from fellow Russian Kolesnikov
and Drancourt. Thirty-four seconds later, a greatly reduced peloton of some
29 riders came over the line; Anthony Charteau's victory was now assured.